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Kordia to rollout and resell Thinxtra’s NZ Sigfox network

April 11, 201610:44Stuart Corner

New Zealand telecommunications and broadcast technology company Kordia – which operates the transmission networks for most of New Zealand’s TV services – has been named as Thinxtra’s preferred partner for the rollout of its Sigfox low powered wide area network in New Zealand, and a reseller of services on the network.

Thinxtra last week announced that New Zealand listed company, Rakon, had invested $A5.8m for a 63.8 percent share to fund the rollout of networks in Australia and New Zealand. Thinxtra aims to have coverage of 30 percent of the Australian and New Zealand populations by the end of 2016, and 85 percent of the two countries’ total population within 18 months.

Thinxtra CEO Loic Barancourt said that, as a provider of business-grade telecommunications solutions, Kordia was the obvious choice of partner. “Kordia has the appropriate infrastructure in place to allow the rapid extension of the Sigfox low power wide area network across New Zealand. Coverage is essential, as it sets the scene for practical IoT deployments without the limitations of restricted network access.” He added that Kordia’s existing client base could be expected to deploy IoT using the Sigfox network.

Kordia CTO Aaron Olphert suggested that the partnership could create export opportunities for New Zealand companies. “An IoT solution developed here, which relies on Sigfox, will work anywhere else.” Sigfox operates networks in 14 countries and claims to have more than seven million devices in its network. It has a target of being active in 60 countries by 2018.

Thinxtra has yet to announce any similar partner for Australia. Kordia has a strong presence in Australia where it provides contracting and consulting services for major telecommunications players, including Telstra, Optus and Vodafone. It has built over 80 towers for Broadcast Australia but, unlike New Zealand, does not operate any networks other than that for the coastal HF radio service. According to its web site it “designed, built and operates the high frequency (HF) radio network, which covers nearly a quarter of the world’s oceans.”